Jaeyoung Kim &
Young-Uk Kim - Violins
Kyuhyun Kim - Viola
Woongwhee Moon - Violoncello
The Strad 22/11/2023: String highlights of the 2023 Edinburgh International Festival
There was a major South Korean focus across both the International Festival and the Fringe, and the Seoul-based Novus Quartet made a big impression in its Queen’s Hall concert. The players’ closing Brahms A minor Quartet showed them at their best – exquisitely balanced, full of passion and perceptive insight. …David Kettle – Review in full
The Strad 28/07/2023 : Novus String Quartet at Wigmore Hall
…. After the interval came another rarity: Schoenberg’s First Quartet. The playing was sinuous and well balanced, with subtle dynamic nuance. The players were good at turning the heat down as well as up when Schoenberg was in full flow, and there was constant shifting of prominence between instruments in this busy score. Amid its astringencies there were glimpses of sinister cabaret and suave coffee house music. The slow section was poised and reflective, with a beautiful, hushed threnody from viola player Kyuhyun Kim. Tim Homfray – Review in full
Positive-feedback.com 13/03/2022 : Novus Quartet Plays Shostakovich
The five-movement F Major Quartet - …The Novus players do a terrific job with this mercurial piece. They take the volatile first movement's shifts and irregularities in stride. The second movement's staccatos are delicate and unsettled; the third is incisively played. The cello outpouring in the Adagio is deep and warm; the finale's fugue is shapely. Everything is well tuned and rhythmically alert. Tempo and mood changes are executed with deft assurance; rubatos and unexpected chordal attacks are impressively unified. This may just be the best quartet rendition of this score since the Emerson Quartet's renowned version. Stephen Francis Vasta - Review in full
Froggy's Delight Mars 2022 : Chostakovitch String Quartets n°3 & n°8
…Dans une interprétation maîtrisée et sensible, le Novus Quartet travaille le timbre, la palette de couleurs sonores et de nuances. Et se rappeler l’opposition entre Chostakovitch et Staline, le compositeur contre le dictateur, l’art contre l’inhumanité. Jérôme Gillet - Article
Diapason Février 2022 : CD Shostakovitch – Quatuors nr 3 et 8
Le Quatuor Novus prend la musique de Chostakovitch à bras-le-corps, affichant l’expressivité et l’acuité sonore les plus exacerbées. Deux précédents enregistrements (Webern, Beethoven, Yun, Berg et Schubert) attestaient déjà son engagement dramatique et sa souveraine maîtrise technique de cet ensemble coréen formé en 2007. ...
On retrouve ici ses timbres acérés et son superbe équilibre entre les pupitres.
…le Quatuor nr 3 op 73, en fa majeur, est l’un des sommets du cycle des quinze quatuors. Sautes d’humeur et brutales ruptures de ton y sont ici âprement soulignées, un peu comme sous les archets des Belcea, mais avec une palette de couleurs moins variée et moins de sensualité, les Novus visant en priorité l’idéal d’un tracé mince et clair. ….
Le Quatuor nr 8 op 110, en ut mineur…Les Novus se gardent d’en surligner la force d’impact, tout en construisant un édifice à l’expression presque constamment âpre et tendue. ….La version des Novus a toutefois pour elle de ne jamais sombrer dans le fouilles et d’éviter la surcharge. Au-delà-de sa rigueur d’abord déconcertante, elle rend l’auditeur progressivement capable d’apercevoir toutes les possibilités, métamorphoses et réminiscences d’une texture finement ciselée. Patrick Szersnovicz
LucidCulture 26/01/2022: An Insightful, Powerful New Recording of Harrowingly Relevant Shostakovich String Quartets
…How does the Novus Quartet’s new recording stack up against the other fearless ensembles who’ve tackled it? They play this one in very high definition. …The Emerson and Jerusalem Quartets have put out more distantly ominous, and arguably more suspenseful recordings, but this one is strong and needs to be heard as widely as possible, given the state of the world right now.
String Quartet No. 3 - …The group tackle the first movement, a Bartokian, reharmonized folk dance, with a visceral starkness, …From there, the ensemble waste no time in developing a sense of foreboding in the briskly waltzing second movement. Is the tiptoeing, balletesque interlude that follows an evocation of hope and renewal, or a typical Shostakovich caricature of the face of evil? Considering the brisk, pouncing, driving rhythms, chase sequences and witchy coda of the third movement, it would seem the latter.
The quartet let the pall linger in the fourth movement: Kyuhyun Kim’s righteously indignant viola out in front of the solemnity packs a wallop. The group return to an emphatic rusticity in lieu of courtly grace in the final movement’s dance sequence. The war may be over, but the dynamics that fueled it are still there, the composer seems to remind us. These insightful performances deserve an encore from the rest of the Shostakovich catalog. Delarue - Review in full
Pizzicato 21/01/2022 : Neue Aspekte von Shostakovichs Seelenwelt
Allegretto of Shostakovich’s 3rd String Quartet - …the Novus Quartet takes a very alert and rhythmically taut start, with – in crystal clear playing -, strong contrasts, rhetorical accents as well as meaningful rubato. And this is really very exciting and immediately gripping. In the second movement, the composer’s ‘con moto’ indication is taken very seriously, and the execution of the complex rhythmic figures is fascinating.
…. In the two concluding movements, Adagio and Moderato, the four Koreans achieve an oppressive expressivity and, in the transparent sound in which the cello plays such an important role, a breathtaking intensity….
8th Quartet - … It may be surprising that in this polished interpretation, clear in all its lines, I had the feeling that Shostakovich was striding into this infinite emptiness with his head held high after all.
The Novus Quartet has undoubtedly revealed new aspects of the Russian composer’s soul. Remy Franck - Resenzion
Qobuz 21/01/2022 : CD Shostakovich: String Quartets - No. 3 in F major’s opening Allegretto is a case in point. Evoking the spirit of the Limoges market in Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition, it bounds into sound with a fabulous, crisply insouciant bounce, textures freshly lucid, and retaining sunniness even where it would be easy to let Shostakovichian sarcastic bite to nudge its way in. As for that aforementioned blending, just listen to the tonal matching between the two violins midway through the final Moderato. Also the sheer sweetness and slender finesse of the first violin’s reprisal of the theme. Review in full
France Musique 14/01/2022: CD de la semaine CD Shostakovitch
…Aujourd'hui, les musiciens nous reviennent avec un nouvel album consacré à Shostakovitch. C’est après avoir atteint la trentaine que le compositeur s’attèle au quatuor à cordes. Il prévoit d’en écrire 24, un cycle complet mais 15 verront le jour. Il fait de ceux-ci le terrain de sa résistance face à un pouvoir soviétique écrasant (pour lequel toute œuvre artistique est politique), ainsi que le lieu d’une expression personnelle, autobiographique, visant à délivrer la « vérité sur lui, l’homme et l’artiste ».
Réunissant les troisième et huitième quatuors, le quatuor corréen donne corps à la révolte de Chostakovitch, dans une peinture fidèle à l’univers magnifique et déchirant de ce compositeur. Emilie Munera & Rodolphe Bruneau-Boulmier - Article
Stimme.de 6/02/2020 : Novus String Quartet aus Südkorea beim Kulturring Heilbronn
…Mit Finesse und dabei erstaunlich zupackend umkreisen Yaeyoung Kim (Violine), Young-Uk Kim (Violine), Kyuhyun Kim (Viola) und Woongwhee Moon (Cello) die Themen Schuberts, der sofort im ersten Satz, ja, mit dem ersten Takt, Fakten schafft: Schubert laviert nicht lange herum. Michaela Adick - Resenzion
Musicweb-International May 2019: CD FRANCK Piano Quintet in F minor
….This is with Michel Dalberto and the Novus Quartet in sterling form, featuring a compelling account of the Piano Quintet. Michael Cookson – Review in full
The classic review.com 26/04/2019: Franck Piano Quintet – Michel Dalberto & Novus String Quartet
…The Novus Quartet which joins in this masterpiece is a fabulous partner, giving the proper support to the solo piano passages yet wonderfully engaged in the many contrasting episodes of the piece. The slow movement is especially moving, combining a sense of stilled beauty and subtle animation. Tal Agam - Review in full
Gramophone 22/03/2019: CD Berg - Lyric Suite & Schubert String Quartet No 14
Schubert String Quartet No. 14, 'Death and the Maiden' - …the Novus Quartet’s subtle command of portamento, this young Korean ensemble turn Schubert to face us head on, stern and unyielding of visage, mortality snapping at his heels. Pure tone lends an unearthly pallor to the slow movement, and subsequent touches of vibrato serve not to impart any rosy glow but rather to deepen the established pathos.
Berg Lyric Suite - …, the Novus capture every whispered confidence of the Scherzo under their breath, aided by an exceptionally close and detailed stereo spread. The image of Berg is caught halfway between Schubert and Ligeti, just where he belongs. Peter Quantrill – Review in full
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